ARC Review: If I Stopped Haunting You by Colby Wilkens

Title: If I Stopped Haunting You
Author: Colby Wilkens
Series: Standalone
Genre: Paranormal/Mystery/Romance
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Publication Date: October 15, 2024
Edition: Digital
Source: NetGalley
Pre-Order: Amazon US | Barnes & Noble | Books-A-Million | Bookshop | Powell's | Thriftbooks

 

 

 

 

 

Synopsis:

   It's been months since horror author Penelope Skinner threw a book at Neil Storm. But he was so infuriating, with his sparkling green eyes and his bestselling horror novels that claimed to break Native stereotypes. And now she’s a publishing pariah and hasn’t been able to write a word since. So when her friend invites her on a too-good-to-be-true writers retreat in a supposedly haunted Scottish castle, she seizes the opportunity. Of course, some things really are too good to be true.
   Neil wants nothing less than to be trapped in a castle with the frustratingly adorable woman who threw a book at him. She drew blood! Worse still, she unleashed a serious case of self-doubt! Neil is terrified to write another bestselling “book without a soul,” as Pen called it. All Neil wants is to find inspiration, while completely avoiding her.
   But as the retreat begins, Pen and Neil are stunned to find themselves trapped in a real-life ghost story. Even more horrifying, they’re stuck together and a truly shocking (extremely hot) almost-kiss has left them rethinking their feelings, and… maybe they shouldn’t have been enemies at all? But if they can’t stop the ghosts pursuing them, they may never have the chance to find out.
 An enemies to lovers romance with a spooky twist where two feuding writers end up on a writers retreat together at a haunted castle in Scotland.
Full of spooky chills and even more sexy thrills, If I Stopped Haunting You by Colby Wilkens is the funny, fast-paced romp romance readers have been waiting for! 

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I loved the rivals-to-lovers dynamic in this book. It was believable and I loved all the characters. Penelope and Neil were in the wrong, and I was glad they talked things through. It took her a while to get there, but Pen did admit that her reaction was wrong, and Neil had his own internal problems to get through.
 
I don't read a lot of horror, so the paranormal aspect of this book fell a little flat for me. There was just something about it that kept me from fully loving it. It wasn't believable. Just something about how it all played out didn't work for me. Ghosts are a hard sell for me already, and the haunting left me confused and with more questions than answers.
 
But I was here more for the romance, so in the end, I enjoyed reading it and I loved the writing overall. The side characters didn't get much page time so I don't have any strong opinions about them. Laszlo and Daniela kind of suck as friends, and ended up being a little irrelevant to the plot. It makes me feel like there should have been more characters since it also seems like Daniela and Laszlo also barely interacted with each other. With only two of the four characters seemingly having any conversations it made the cast of characters feel "empty".
 
I will certainly be reading more from this author, I like her writing style.